We all managed to make it to Doug's house for the party. Jamie brought stuff for Quesadillas. Kara made some very delicious potatoes. We brought some fruit salad and stuffed celery. Kara made a rum cake for dessert. We ate, we talked, we opened presents. Emily almost, but not quite, got the idea of opening gifts. I think she actually had more fun just ripping the paper. But once the gifts were open she liked the gifts.
She had fun playing with everyone, especially Aunt Jamie.
We had a really nice time. All the guys went outside later and shoveled and snow-blowed Doug's porch and walkways and driveway so we could get out. We drove home slowly but safely. The snow is supposed to stop sometime during the night. Here's our picture window after the snow drifted over the sill outside:
This is how it looks so far and we still have a good 6-8 hours before it's supposed to wind down. And another Nor'easter is scheduled for Sunday night. Parents are all going to have to home school pretty soon - the kids are missing so much. My sister is a teacher's aide and she was out all week. Plus last Friday. Plus possibly Monday if we get the storm they're predicting. Then they were scheduled to go to school Tuesday and be off for winter break!
We took off to walk to Central Park.
Just walking down the street was an eye-opener. I have never, ever seen so many people. When the lights would change there would be a huge surge and you had to run for your life to keep up. It was very difficult to keep our group of ten together. We saw lots of cool Christmas decorations along the way. Everything was beautiful.
Central Park was nice. We saw the horse-drawn carriages, and the ice-rink there.
I liked that one better...more open and a beautiful view of the city.
We walked all the way up to 74th St. to see the "Dakota" which is the building where John Lennon was killed. Unfortunately, I took pictures of the wrong building! Across the street from the Dakota in Central Park is "Strawberry Fields" and "Imagine" which are dedicated to John Lennon . Strawberry Fields turned out to be a sign.....that's all.
And the "Imagine" was just this brick thing on the ground. Kind of disappointing.
As we continued on to find the subway that would take us to Times Square, we found a bakery that had cupcakes.....buy six get two free. We all got cupcakes and ate them right there. mmmmmmmm.
We got on the subway with just a little trouble and got off at the right place. Times Square was just unbelievable. What you see on TV doesn't do it justice. It was big, busy....overwhelming. Everything was larger than life. And the people! The crowds! You were literally swept along the sidewalk. You couldn't stop if you wanted to gawk at anything. I took pictures on the fly.
We walked and walked. We came to the Hershey store and literally could not get into it for all the people inside. Across the street was the M and M store......4 stories dedicated to M and M's. But the line to get in was around the block!!
I got a pretzel and a pashmina at side-walk vendors. $3 for the pretzel and $5 for the pashmina! We finally went to Madam Toussad's Wax Museum. That was the best part of the day for me. The figures were right out where you could see and touch them and take pictures standing beside them. There were too many for me to take pics of everyone. But they had movie stars and sports figures and politicians. All of them looked remarkably like humans. The ones whose eyes were looking right at you freaked you out because you wondered if they were real but just standing really still and would jump out and scare you! The flash from the pictures reflects off the wax and gives them a shiny look but when you see them in real life the flesh looks real.
We had reservations at a restaurant at 5, but were getting nervous about whether we'd have enough time to eat and get back to Rockefeller Center for 6:30 for the bus. They had originally said 7, so I thought dinner at 5 would give us plenty of time. So we went to the restaurant early to see if we could get in. The trouble was....the other four girls who had gone shopping were supposed to meet us for dinner and wouldn't be able to get there for our new earlier time. We called them and they said they'd find something on their own. I was very disappointed that we didn't get to all eat together.
The restaurant was okay. It was a brewery and I don't drink beer. But they also made their own rootbeer which was delicious. We left the restaurant and decided we should take the subway back to Rockefeller Center and spend whatever time we had left over there so we'd be near where the bus was parked.
We went to the subway and stood in a long line to buy passes. Then the passes weren't working right. Half of us were on one side of the turnstyle and half couldn't get through. After 1/2 hour we were in. In the wrong subway. We asked random people how to get to Rockefeller. They didn't know. Finally Sarah took the bull by the horns and went to ask someone who works there. He told us we were in the wrong station. We didn't want to pay another $20 for more passes so we got on and went the one stop we were able to go to get a little closer. When we got out of the subway we were still in Times Square!! Now it was getting late. So we decided to hoof it to Rockefeller. I think it was about 8 blocks. The rest of the group was power-walking, dodging people, going into the street to get around. I tried hard to keep up but at certain points I could no longer see my group. I was a little scared because I had no idea where to go if I lost them. I did have a cell phone ......though I doubt anyone would have heard their phone ringing.
We made it back to the bus at 6:50. The bus left on schedule at 7. The ride home was long despite watching 2 complete movies. I was glad to get home, even though at that point there was still no power. Hubby was keeping the bed warm and we got our power back early Sunday morning.
We left around 9:30 and it was still raining. We had just gone to bed at about 11pm when we heard a loud boom and all the lights went out. Hubby happened to be looking out the window and said he saw a big flash. The transformer in front of our house had exploded. All the condos in our area were in darkness.
All night long we heard the huge crack and then the sound of a falling branch and then the branch hitting the ground. I didn't get much sleep....I heard the branches falling every 2-5 minutes or so. All. night. long. 
Surprisingly the roads were not icy so Hubby got ready and left for work. He barely had to scrape his car. 
